The banquet began with a hypocritical toast to modesty from a speaker standing beneath three portraits of himself. (hypocritical: insincere, two-faced, dissembling) His ostentatious display did not trouble him, although he criticized a child for wearing a paper crown. (ostentatious: showy, pretentious, flamboyant) The host tried to scrutinize the seating plan without appearing to search for a convenient place to hide. (scrutinize: examine closely, inspect carefully, study attentively) An insufferable argument over precedence had already delayed the soup by twenty minutes. (insufferable: unbearable, intolerable, exasperating)
A staunch volunteer defended the rule that the people serving food should also have time to eat it. (staunch: steadfast, loyal, firmly committed) She asked the organizers to stipulate a stopping time for speeches before anyone agreed to a second helping. (stipulate: specify, require, set as a condition) The chairman's effusive praise of the volunteers sounded less convincing while they carried plates through his uninterrupted address. (effusive: gushing, exuberant, enthusiastic) A felicitous remark from the child suggested that gratitude might be expressed by passing the bread rather than describing it. (felicitous: apt, well-chosen, fitting)
The room experienced a fortuitous interval of silence when the microphone stopped working beside an unplugged socket. (fortuitous: accidental, chance, unplanned) An equitable arrangement emerged during the pause: every table could choose one short story and one person to tell it. (equitable: fair, impartial, just) The stories revealed a diverse group whose experiences did not fit the chairman's single account of admirable behavior. (diverse: varied, wide-ranging, heterogeneous) Their integrity appeared most clearly when speakers admitted mistakes without pretending that every error had been educational by design. (integrity: honesty, uprightness, probity)
One guest described the fortitude required to apologize after blaming a neighbor for a broken window. (fortitude: courage, endurance, strength of mind) Another explained how temperance had made a heated committee meeting more useful than a loud victory would have been. (temperance: moderation, restraint, self-control) The child's irreverent suggestion that the portraits should also receive dessert was gently declined. (irreverent: disrespectful, cheeky, irreverential) Yet the room's congenial atmosphere survived, because disagreement no longer required everyone to defend an exaggerated sense of importance. (congenial: pleasant, agreeable, friendly)
The volunteer described an oxymoron when someone announced a modest extravaganza beneath the portraits. (oxymoron: combination of contradictory terms, compressed verbal contradiction, pairing of conflicting expressions) The child offered a hyperbole about being hungry enough to eat the entire table, which nobody confused with an actual plan. (hyperbole: exaggeration, overstatement, extravagant expression) These playful uses of language worked because the listeners could distinguish deliberate invention from a claim about what had happened. (playful: sportive, lighthearted, amusing) The chairman's earlier equivocation had been less enjoyable because it concealed who was supposed to help carry the food. (equivocation: evasiveness, hedging, ambiguous language)
An inquisitive guest asked how the volunteer had learned to manage difficult discussions without making every disagreement personal. (inquisitive: curious, questioning, interested) Her candid answer included several earlier mistakes and no claim that she now handled every situation perfectly. (candid: frank, open, honest) The room's receptive mood made that admission useful rather than embarrassing. (receptive: open, responsive, willing to consider) A shared interest in improving the evening replaced the effort to decide who had possessed the finest character before dessert. (shared: mutual, common, joint)
The chairman gave a succinct apology for monopolizing the evening and helped carry the empty plates into the kitchen. (succinct: brief, concise, terse) His subsequent behavior mattered more than whether his apology contained the most impressive word in the room. (subsequent: later, following, ensuing) A salient distinction remained between praising a virtue and making a small decision consistent with it. (salient: prominent, striking, noticeable) The host ended with a cordial invitation to return next year, provided the portraits agreed to stay home. (cordial: warm, sincere, friendly)